CTU Open 2025: Thrilling to the End – with Matfyz team in the Lead

Our first year partnering with the CTU Open competition is behind us. A mix of brilliant minds, team dynamics, and a healthy dose of algorithmic adrenaline proved why supporting competitive programming truly makes sense.

Training Before the Finals? Definitely Worth It.

We got involved a week before the final round by hosting a pre-competition workshop focused on strategic thinking, effective teamwork, and sample problems with model solutions – exactly the skills that make the difference when it counts. At Friday’s opening of the competition, students could then test their teamwork under real conditions on our training problem.

On Saturday, the real thing began – a five-hour race against time, algorithms, and one’s own limits.

Familiar Faces at the Top

Among the top teams, we recognized several participants from our workshop – and the winning team was none other than the one that had submitted the best solution to our training problem just a day earlier. The victorious team MFF 1 from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics (Matfyz), composed of Benjamin S., Dan S., and Jiří K., solved 10 out of 12 problems and took a clear overall win.

In December, they will represent the Czech Republic at the Central European Regional Contest (CERC 2025) in Wrocław where the stakes are high: a place in both the European Finals and the ICPC World Grand Finals 2026.

One Computer. Three People. Five Hours.

CTU Open is an official part of the prestigious ICPC – International Collegiate Programming Contest system. The format is simple but unforgiving: one computer per team, twelve algorithmic problems, five hours of pure competition.

Beyond programming languages (C++, Java, Python, C, Kotlin), what matters most is the ability to assess a situation quickly, estimate difficulty, choose the right strategy – and sometimes, to walk away from a problem altogether. That’s why, at Qminers, our workshop focused on decision-making under pressure, drawing on principles we know well: when to take a risk, when to rethink your plan, and why sometimes less is more.

Congratulations!

CTU Open 2025 reminded us that curiosity for algorithms, the ability to collaborate, and the drive to improve are still alive and well. And it was a joy to see that great ideas, smart strategies, and teamwork don’t stay in theory – they really do lead to victory.

Congratulations to all the teams who took on the challenge – and especially to those who made it to the podium. We’re already looking forward to next year’s edition!